The bottling industry supply beverage pre-mix supplies to restaurants, cafeterias, and other members of the retail sales industry who in turn use post mixing beverage dispensers to provide soft drinks for their customers. Typical post mixing dispensers are connected with a source of beverage syrup or concentrate, a source of water and a source of soda water either from a remote carbonator or the carbonator may be integrated into the beverage dispenser itself.
The supply of water and the supply of water for creating the soda water are normally obtained from the water which is piped to the building either from a municipal water department or from a well and thus the water is at a temperature that will vary according to the different environmental factors affecting the source of the water. The supply of beverage syrup or concentrate normally comes from some type of beverage syrup or concentrate container which is normally stored at room temperature. In order to provide a continuous supply of cold dispensed beverages, beverage dispensers have been developed which cool the components of the final beverage as they travel between their source and the dispensing nozzle.
The typical ice cooled beverage dispenser has an ice storage bin at the bottom of which is located a cold plate. A cold plate is normally aluminum having stainless steel tubing defining a circuitous route for each of the various beverage components traveling through it. When the ice bin is filled with ice, either manually or automatically, the ice chills the cold plate which in turn chills the beverage components as they each travel their circuitous route through the cold plate. By keeping the cold plate at a constant chilled temperature, the final dispensing temperature of the dispensed beverage can be maintained at a desirable level. In order to maintain the constant chilled temperature of the cold plate, the ice bins on these beverage dispensers need to be continuously refilled with ice. In addition to maintaining the chilled temperature of the cold plate, the supply of ice is also used, by most beverage dispensers, for the filling of beverage containers prior to the dispensing of the actual beverage. Thus, the volume of ice required is dependent upon the volume of beverages being dispensed both because of the chilling of the cold plate and the filling of the beverage containers. In order to minimize the amount of manual labor, some beverage dispensers are combined with an automatic ice maker.
One problem associated with beverage dispensers is the bridging of the ice within the ice bin. Bridging of the ice normally happens when the ice which is in contact with the cold plate remains undisturbed for an extended period of time. Bridging occurs when individual pieces of ice above the cold plate freeze together. When the ice in direct contact with the cold plate melts, pockets of air will form between the ice and the cold plate. The ice above the cold plate, which is now frozen together, is incapable of falling down to fill the air pockets. Thus, the amount of ice in contact with the cold plate is reduced. This bridging effect can significantly reduce the cooling ability of the beverage dispenser. In order to avoid bridging of the ice and to insure proper cooling of the cold plate, it is necessary that a continuous shifting of the ice within the bin be maintained. By continuously shifting the ice which is in contact with the cold plate, bridging of the ice is avoided and the cooling efficiency of the beverage dispenser is maintained insuring a dispensed beverage at a cooled constant temperature.
One method of keeping the ice moving is to balance the quantity of ice being used with the quantity of ice available. Then when the ice is used for filling the beverage containers prior to dispensing the beverage, the constant scooping action of the ice scooper into the supply of ice is normally enough movement to insure the elimination of bridging. However, when the quantity of ice available greatly exceeds the quantity of ice required, the action of filling the beverage containers will not disturb the ice located at the bottom of the ice bin which is in contact with the cold plate. This is because any used ice will be replaced prior to the ice level in the ice bin being reduced a sufficient amount for the beverage container filling action to effect the ice located at the bottom of the ice bin adjacent to the cold plate. It is therefore necessary to provide an ice bin storage capacity which is based upon the volume requirements of the individual user particularly when the ice is automatically supplied to the ice bin.
Prior art beverage dispensers utilize a constant volume ice bin. Because of the constant volume of ice being supplied, it is necessary to change beverage dispensers as the demand for the amount of dispensed beverages varies. The amount of ice required is directly related to the amount of beverages dispensed. The changing of the individual beverage dispensers to constantly match the volume of ice to the volume of dispensed beverages is a costly and time consuming process and requires the bottlers or supplier of the syrup or concentrate to keep a large quantity of the different ice capacity beverage dispensers on hand.
Accordingly, what is needed is a beverage dispenser which has the capability to quickly and efficiently vary the quantity of ice stored in the ice bin in response to the various demands which the customer places on the dispenser unit. In this way, the balance between the volume of ice and the volume of dispensed beverage can be easily maintained.